Balen likely to resign as Kathmandu Mayor on Jan 18

KATHMANDU: Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) Mayor Balen Shah is preparing to resign from his post on January 18.

Mayor Shah, who has joined the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) as a senior leader, is set to step down two days before filing his candidacy for the House of Representatives (HoR) election scheduled for March 5, according to a member of his Secretariat.

As per the Election Commission’s timetable, nominations for the House of Representatives election will be registered on January 20.

The RSP has already declared Balen as its prime ministerial candidate for the upcoming election. Meanwhile, Balen is also preparing to contest from Jhapa-5, challenging CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli. In this regard, he held a one-and-a-half-hour discussion with local leaders from Jhapa on Sunday.

Mayor Balen met a team including RSP Jhapa Chairman Prakash Pathak and Secretary Shambhu Suskera at the residence of his secretariat member Kumar Ben in Jwagal, Lalitpur-10.

According to Pathak, Balen stated during the meeting that he had decided to contest from Jhapa-5. He also informed that his team had conducted a preliminary survey of the constituency, assessing development activities, infrastructure, and the condition of traditional political parties.

Jhapa-5 is also the constituency of Oli, who has won elections there repeatedly, except in 2064 BS when he was defeated by a Maoist candidate. Additionally, secretariat sources said that Balen met Tharuhat movement leaders Laxman Tharu and Surendra Chaudhary on Sunday.